Tagged: Detroit Free Press

A few weeks have passed now since a gunman took the lives of four journalists and a sales assistant In a brutal newsroom attack at the Capital Gazette in Annapolis. That weekend editors from the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News wrote moving editorials.

Nolan Finley of the News revealed that a group of fellow journalists there personally felt the resemblance to the harassment they had also been receiving for five years from a man sending emails spewing some of the most vile vulgar, racist and anti-Semitic poison they had ever read. Peter Bhatia, Editor of the Free Press declared that “we are fact-driven. We are motivated by truth-telling. And the fact that journalists have now joined high school students and concert-goers as targets of gun violence in our country doesn’t change a thing.”

I started my career in journalism and publishing at a newspaper in Michigan and worked my way into an Investigative beat. A fellow reporter on another local paper was Investigating an illegal abortion mill that involved the local mafia. He let colleagues know that he was getting death threats. Calls went around and several of us joined him that evening to play poker all night. We didn’t have guns or even knives. But we knew we couldn’t let him face the threat alone.Nothing ever happened, but I was proud that we looked out for each other.

Today I worry that such threats not only continue. but a disturbed and angry man in Annapolis finally carried out his threats with a firearm. While I am proud that journalists are not deterred, I hope that as a nation, we can find a path back to respect for the important role of the media in a free society. Bhatia concluded his editorial by quoting Josh McKerrow, the Annapolis photojournalist. “The shrill chaos seems to be winning. But it’s not winning – and it’s not going to win.”

I grew up in a vibrant Detroit, the proud and thriving automobile capital of the world. And in 1967, as I studied for my undergraduate degree at Wayne State University in the heart of the city, I had no idea that a raid on a nearby after-hours club that summer would ultimately signal the collapse of many of the city’s neighborhoods and eventually ignite massive white flight. I thought our country’s involvement in Vietnam would remain the focus of protest that year, not our own angry citizens burning down the inner city.

In 2017, media attention on the 50th anniversary of the Detroit riots, revolution or uprising (depending on who you ask) is forcing residents to reassess what brought on such rage. The violence lasted five days following the original police raid on July 23 – and Stephen Henderson, the editorial director of the Detroit Free Press, and others are questioning if the city has really learned the lessons of those violent days. While it is clear that change is coming to some areas of Detroit –focusing for now heavily on the vibrant downtown and some midtown neighborhoods, including around Wayne State University – many angry black residents still live in neglected areas and continue to question whether their lives will ever improve.

On Sunday the 23rd, I joined college friends to watch the local ABC-TV premiere of the Detroit Free Press documentary on those five days – “12th and Clairmont.” I found that the focus on the home-made films submitted by those swept up by the violence gave an authentic voice to the complex emotions behind the turmoil and lingering anger. Now a movie is premiering here called “Detroit” by award-winning filmmaker Kathryn Bigelow that details the particularly brutal deaths of three black teenagers in the Algiers Hotel in the course of those five horrific days. I hope the local Free Press documentary and the nationally distributed film will give Americans a greater understanding of that ominous year in Detroit – and an appreciation for the on-going struggle facing not only the Motor City, but cities across our nation. Let’s continue to listen to the anger, learn and move forward.

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RAMedia consultant Jan Andrew believes in staying ahead of the curve. Jan was involved in creating multicultural coalitions in Los Angeles and San Francisco in the 90s, and joined her late partner Tim Robinson, a legendary journalist, in helping to publicize and define editorial content on the Web at the turn of the millennium. Now in Michigan, she helps clients coast to coast shape communications for a global media age, including a new specialty – laughter meditation. Learn more about RAmedia services.